You can move the girl out of the Midwest, but can you take the Midwest out of her?, or
The misadventures of a librarian in Baltimore

Friday, December 24, 2004

Things have just changed so much over the past week.

The new job. That one thing has changed everything, including my sleeping pattern.I am alternately excited, terrified, nervous, and enthusiastic.I don’t want to tell people about it, because I don’t want to seem like a big headed person.I also don’t want to seem to have false modesty.I think they like me at work and don’t want to lose me.

Things have just changed so much in the past week.Before getting the job, I wasn’t real happy with my job situation, and I was planning to get the heck out of Baltimore after my lease is up.I miss my family and friends back in Wisconsin.I had just gone to a wedding in Madison that made me realize how much fun I had with my old friends.I know everyday is not like a wedding and that I won’t be able to hang out with old friends all the time, but I would have a better opportunity to do so if I wasn’t in Baltimore.

And yet, I like Baltimore.I have friends here, from work and church.I have made connections and they make it harder to want to leave.I thought that the job would be the sticking point, and it created a reason that I had to leave – I am bored and I don’t make enough money and I just want to be closer to home.

And now there are all these expectations for me – I have to be an assistant manager.I will be the youngest person in management at the library.I mean, seriously, the next oldest person is my new boss and he’s got over a decade on me.It’s terrifying and exciting all at the same time.Can I handle such responsibility?

I have to say, yes, I can handle it.It will be a lot easier once I get into things and don’t have time to worry as much.I am, as Future boss has apparently been told, a quick learner.Picking up business, science and technology really shouldn’t be the end of the world, and the job center actually will be fun.I think.I hope.

I guess it all boils down to the fact that I really like helping people, and that the subject matter isn’t as important to me.I just want to help people meet their information needs.Also, thinking about the fact that I was going to have to do programming made me get out my old library science books and think that I should re-read them.I am such a nerd.But I loved the management class that I took in college.Seriously, my goal has always been to get into administration.(Although, I did not expect to start now in management.) I want to be a library director when I am older – well, perhaps older than thirty – although not at a system like this one.No way.That is just a little too disconnected from the actual services.I just think that I have a gift for organization and things like that.Let’s just hope that I get better at dealing with people in a management/I'm your boss, kind of manner.

Still, I feel like there are all these expectations.My bosses keep saying that I will be so great for the position and that they are really excited about it. The level of enthusiasm for me getting this job is just kind of overwhelming. Is this the reason that I am waking up after only five hours of sleep now?I am just so annoyed with myself…I wake up and start thinking.My mind just races and I can’t turn off my brain.And it’s all new job related.It’s frustrating.I’M ON VACATION RIGHT NOW!!!I set my alarm clock (optimistically) for eight o’clock.I woke up at four am.

<>I don’t want to keep going on about the new job.I feel bad for my roommate because that’s all she hears about from me.I just keep going on and on and on and on…And the money issue is kind of major, but not really at the same time. I think that (sadly) I will do it no matter how much more money I am getting.I just wish that I hadn’t been offered the position until March.Stupid eighteen months starting over again!

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So, yeah, I just need to turn off my brain whilst on vacation.Seriously, it is truly disturbing to wake up at four am and think about work on CHRISTMAS EVE.There is just something wrong with it.Normal people don’t think as much as I do.Why can’t I be normal?I suppose this is normal for me…but it’s freakin’ annoying.I mean, seriously, what can I do about the no sleeping issue?Uh, nothing really, except start the bloody job.

I know I said I wouldn’t be writing in this darn thing while I was on vacation, but when I wake up at four am, there are limited options to what one can do.And perhaps this will help me understand why I am waking up so early in the morning…maybe this will help turn my brain off while I am in Wisconsin.